Big Banks Race to Embrace Stablecoins in Finance Shift

Some of the world's biggest banks have made a major decision: they're no longer debating whether digital dollars belong in the financial system — they're figuring out how to use them.

What are stablecoins? These are a type of cryptocurrency (digital money that lives on the internet) designed to always be worth the same as a real-world currency, like the US dollar. So one stablecoin usually equals one dollar. This makes them far less risky than coins like Bitcoin, whose prices jump up and down wildly.

This week, Standard Chartered (a large global bank) announced it would let its big business clients directly create ("mint") and cash out ("redeem") a popular stablecoin called USDC, made by a company named Circle.

Standard Chartered isn't alone. Just days earlier, BNY — the world's largest custody bank (a bank that safely stores assets for big clients) — also expanded its own USDC services.

Here are the key facts:

• Stablecoin settlement volumes (the total value of money moved using these coins) could reach a staggering $1 quadrillion per year by 2030, according to research firm Chainalysis. That's 1,000 trillion dollars.
• Banks now see stablecoins as part of the everyday "plumbing" of finance — used for payments, treasury management, and settling deals quickly.
• Industry experts say the real value isn't the coins themselves, but the networks and liquidity (the ease of moving money around) built around them.

Europe is fighting back too. European banks want to create stablecoins tied to the euro, not just the dollar. Their fear? If they don't, all digital money activity might default to dollar-backed coins, weakening Europe's financial control.

The bottom line: Stablecoins have gone from a niche crypto tool to something major banks are competing to offer. As more institutions join in, digital dollars could become a normal part of how the world moves money.

This is an AI-generated summary. Read the original article at: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2026/07/05/banks-have-stopped-asking-if-stablecoins-belong-in-finance-now-they-re-considering-how